...Dated graphics give these missions the feel of an amateurish mod rather than a campaign befitting the Counter-Strike name. When asked to comment, Ritual's art director hostilely declined...

As I understand it to be, the half-life engine is the bottleneck on the game's graphics, not the developers art director.

There is some other new material (pertaining to the game we haven't heard before). [*] Valve has finished the content, but the bots need to be fully polished before release.[*] Valve is apparently leaving Rituals logo on the splash screen.